


The End Where We Began

by terrormusical



Category: The White Stripes
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-10-12
Updated: 2011-10-12
Packaged: 2017-10-24 13:44:50
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 3
Words: 8,936
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/264122
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/terrormusical/pseuds/terrormusical
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The White Stripes' career from beginning to end as I like to believe it happened. Fanfiction disguised as fiction.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. What A Season

**Author's Note:**

> Hey! So I know White Stripes fanfiction is _the weirdest_ thing ever. But I was watching their documentary and started making up this grand, dramatic back story that I _had_ to write. I tried to make it a little less like fanfiction and a little more like a real story.
> 
> Title taken from the lovely song of the same name by The Script. Chapter titles from _Now Mary_ by the Stripes themselves.
> 
> Enjoy (:

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Pre-marriage to first gig.

It was one of those chilly starry nights, the kind of nights when it might snow but it probably won't, because they weatherman said it wouldn't, and the faraway clouds are another sign that it's not likely, so instead of driving he walked to the bar that night.

It was a quaint little bar, a three-story building smashed up and crooked between two other nameless stores. It was small inside, the bar lining one wall, a jukebox in the corner, and three booths opposite the counter. The windows were so dirty that it was near impossible to see inside. He pulled his collar up over his ears as the building came into view, soft, yellow light spilling on the sidewalk outside. It looked warm inside and goosebumps spread over his skin at the sight of the place. The wind lashed and stung at all the exposed skin, and he shoved his shaking hands into his pockets as deep as they'd go. The night was young but it was already dark and the streetlights were buzzing, emitting artificial light high above him. Everyone was eating dinner. The streets were quiet, and they stayed that way all winter. The kids stayed inside, watching television. The adults did, too. He was completely alone.

The door to the bar was tilted on its hinges, threatening to fall off any day. He opened it gingerly, taking special care not to let it slam behind him. Warm air rushed around him from all sides, and he lingered by the door until he felt completely thawed. It took one look at the bar for him to smile.

“Hey,” the woman said, giving him a little smile as she wiped down the crystal glasses and set them back in their spots. The bottles of liquor behind the bar glistened, all packed onto the shelves in neat rows. She looked lost between them, consumed by them. He wondered how she knew what they were; most of the bottles were unlabeled. He wanted to ask. Instead he returned her greeting and slipped his wool coat off his shoulders, throwing it into a booth as he passed it. Taking a seat at the bar, he rested his chin in his hands and watched her work. I could do this for hours, he thought, eyes following her long, thin fingers as they spun a few bottles around so that the worn labels face outward. She took a few empty ones down, holding four in one hand, the long glass necks pinched between her fingers.

“What can I get for you?” She didn't look up at him, didn't meet his eyes as she spoke. She usually did with other customers; she was polite and friendly when she had to be. But he wasn't just another customer. He came there often, only when she was working, it seemed. She was in love with him, even if she didn't want to believe it. Her heart was already aware of it; her head hadn't caught up yet. But somewhere, back in the darkest corners of her mind, she knew.

“Fries,” he said, decidedly, furrowing his eyebrows as she tucked the empty bottles somewhere out of view, somewhere under the counter. The food there wasn't that great, but they made it to order. It would give him an excuse to stay there a little longer. “And whatever is in that bottle with the purple label.”

She raised her eyebrows, pointing to the bottle she was nearly positive he was referencing. “That's the one,” he confirmed with a small nod and a smile.

“Do you know what it is?”

“Do you?” He challenged.

“The strongest shit you'll ever taste,” she said, pulling the bottle off the shelf and removing the cap, her pale fingers a blur around the top of the bottle. She angled it at least a foot above the glass and he watched as it poured out, nice and smooth, splashing over the ice. The cup was in front of him seconds later, and when he looked back up again, he caught a glimpse of her dark hair as she turned to the corner into the kitchen. She was smiling, he noted, wondering why.

He listened to the melancholy sounds of the jukebox while she was gone, the neon lights in the window behind him casting flickering reflections on the wooden paneling of the walls. A Hendrix song was playing, one that he knew but the title escaped him. He sung along under his breath, tapping his fingers on the varnished wood of the bar. His callouses made sharp sounds that disrupted the static stillness of the little bar, probably a noise that wasn't heard often within the little box the walls created. Soft fifties music, bottles clinking, the door opening and closing, maybe the dull hum of talking during the busier hours of the day. Never guitar-hardened fingers tapping, never anyone singing along.

She emerged all too soon, not even minutes later. “I knew you'd want them.” She shrugged to answer his puzzled stare, brushing the small act off with a soft quirk of her pink lips. She wiped down the counter to his left, breezing past him and cleaned the counter to his right. All the while he watched her gaze at the already gleaming counter as if it were the most beautiful, puzzling thing she'd ever seen, and he decided that she must throw herself into everything she does. She was the kind of person that not only finished what she started, but did a damn good job. He took a bite of his fries, chewed calculatedly, and without thinking took a swig of his whiskey. She laughed, bright and resonating as he sputtered and choked on the mouthful, trying to swallow.

“Get me something else,” he croaked, still coughing. “Anything.”

She smiled once more, baring her teeth this time, and tucked a stray strand of black hair behind her ear as she turned back to the wall of liquor. He watched with stinging, watery eyes as she ran her index finger over them, slipping over the valleys and peaks the rounded bottles created, before she stopped walking and tapped her finger one, pulling it out by the neck. “Here.” She slid the bottle across the table without emptying its contents into the glass. Her elbows settled on the countertop, chin resting on the hammock her twined fingers created, head cocked, grinning. “You'll like it, I swear.”

He took her word for it, because he'd take her word for anything. He knew her for a little over a month; he started making conversation around the four week mark. A week later, they were friends. A week later, they might have been a little more. It was plain to anyone. No one could deny the tension between them, how the heated air pulled tight and quivering like steel cables whenever she drew near. They turned heads when they smiled at each other. His ears perked up when she spoke, and all the noise that wasn't her voice rose to a dull ringing until it faded into the background and she was all he was capable of hearing. And he didn't just hear her, he listened, and he didn't truly listen to many people. All his life, he couldn't be told what to do. He never got a sensible job, he never did what was practical, despite the fact that people told him to. He couldn't be dominated. She dominated him. It was something in the way she moved, as if underwater, smooth and fluid. It was the dimples in her rosy cheeks, her otherwise pale skin. It was her quiet nature; it was the dormant strength in her voice on the rare occasions it was heard.

Whatever she gave him was smooth and sweet, like warm honey, and it coated his throat, smoothed over the edges of his vision as he set down the bottle. It made a hollow, faraway sound as it hit the counter. He looked up into her eyes, and they were dark and deep, like he was staring into two black holes. He wanted to see behind them. He wanted to brush the hair in front of her ear. He wanted to kiss her knowing that she would kiss back. He wanted her. “Marry me,” he said, inhibitions washed away by the strong, sweet alcohol. She seemed to mull it over for a second, head still running as fast as it could to catch up with her heart, now sprinting quite quickly itself, and finally, after hours, it seemed, she nodded. It was a slight forward tilt of the head. Had it not been for her blossoming smile, he might have thought it never happened.

 

  
The club was dark, maybe a little shady, he'd admit that. But it was a gig. The audience seemed enthusiastic enough, clapping after songs like they meant it, even cheering after the faster ones. Not just because they felt like it was the polite thing to do. The stage was elevated enough so that he could see most of the faces in the crowd, only really noticing one, the smiling face of his wife in the far back corner. Her hair was down as usual, her arms crossed, and he kept his eyes on her for the entirety of every song. He even saw a few people following his gaze back to the grinning girl, knowing she'd only have good things to say about the way he poured his soul into the microphone, and how he was on fire, how the big solo sounded great, too. He already knew it.

They met with the owner of the club, guitar cases in tow, accepting the slightly forced compliments with slightly forced thanks, taking the long, white envelopes one by one. He cracked it open as he made his way to the back of the bar to find her. Fifty dollars. So, maybe they wouldn't be going out for dinner that week like they usually did.

“You did great.” Her beret was already positioned perfectly on her head, her peacoat buttoned up to the last button, dark hair shining as it cascaded over her shoulders. She held out his coat to him, smiling, hands clasped as he buttoned it, waiting patiently. The crowd was dissolving around them, the club quieting back down once more, people flooding out the door and rushing past them. He wondered if they liked the show. He wondered if they recognized him. He wondered if they wanted to compliment him but were too shy. He wondered who was drunk, who would forget it all in the morning.

His warm hand found hers as they walked back to his house, his guitar case hitting his leg as they strolled in silence. They air was warming gradually. Soon they wouldn't need coats or hats to cover the tips of their ears. Soon, but not quite yet.

Night brought the same things it usually did, a late microwaved meal, a half hour of television before they lost interest and started kissing, too wrapped up in each other to notice anything else. The kissing eventually led to wandering touches, slow, burning movements, gasps and choked off moans, shifting shadows and blurry vision and whispered sentiments as they drifted off to sleep, his arms wrapped around her. She was his. Four months ago, he hadn't known her. Four months ago, he was using all the money from his day job to fund his passion, his band, the job that mattered to him, making negative profit and barely being able to pay his mortgage, too proud, of course, to accept money from his parents. He met her just in time, an independent person just like himself, strong and quick-witted with the secret desire to fall in love buried deep inside. They needed each other.

He woke up the next morning to a empty bed, noticing a note on the pillow and straining his eyes to read the messy script in the dull gray morning light. She had left to get groceries, and she'd be back to drop them off before she headed off once more to work at the bar; she had the closing shift. He sighed into his pillow, wishing she would just leave that place, but he knew that was impossible. Without that job, they'd never have enough money to support two people. They were attached to the place; it was where they met. She'd never leave unless something somehow better came along, and they both knew it. He lay down once again, tucking his hands under the back of his head. It was Saturday, and he had the day off at the upholsterer's. He had no gig tonight, nor did he have the desire to play. He just wanted to stay in bed all day long with his wife, the only person he swore he could ever love, the only person he wanted to talk to, the person that wasn't there.

The next day he had band practice with the boys, and they had told him she could tag along if she wanted. They were all single, and he was wary, but she insisted on going with him and truly meeting his friends. After hearing all his stories from shows and practices and laughing along with him, she wanted to make memories of her own with them, wanted to be able to look back and say, yes, that was funny. She wanted to be treated like one of guys; she didn't want to be treated delicately. She had always harbored a strong feeling that she had something to prove, ever since she moved out when she was eighteen. As if finding a job and supporting herself wasn't enough to prove her independence, she wanted another challenge.

“Don't worry about me,” she told him as they walked, looping her arms through his. “I bet we'll have a great time.” He smiled over at her, studying the smooth lines of her angelic face, watching as the wind whipped dark strands of straight hair and she struggled to hold his gaze and tame them with her free hand. He chuckled. It was getting warmer, and she was wearing one of his lighter jackets; he was wearing only a t-shirt.

“I bet we will,” he agreed.

 

 

The first thing that caught her eye when she entered the room was the drum kit. The drums were shiny, smooth and rounded, like all the bottles on the back wall of the bar. They were held together with metallic screws, big, adjustable facets, at least ten on every drum. She wanted to tap them all with her fingers, just to see what sounds they made. She wanted to know why there were so many cymbals, sitting still and glimmering in the light on their thin, silver stands. She wanted to pick up the drumsticks that were resting on the big drum, the one with its own legs off to the right. She wanted to pick them up and hit the cymbals until she had all the different sounds memorized, until she understood. She always had to understand everything.

“I want to learn how to play those,” she said, and he looked up from tuning his guitar. His eyes darted in the direction she was pointing and he brushed the hair out of his eyes as he looked up at his wife. His gaze landed on the two long, gleaming bass guitars, necks stretching gracefully toward the ceiling. They were much more grand than guitars, the strings and frets much wider and mesmerizing.

“The basses?” He asked, noting that bass guitar wasn't too different from normal guitar. Smiling, he swayed closer. “I'll teach you.”

“Not the basses,” she said, voice dropping to her signature nervous, quiet tone. Her voice got that way whenever she was determined but too shy to act it; whenever she had something strong to say but held it back. It was her way of acting the opposite of what she was feeling. It was how she hid. He hadn't known her for long, but he knew exactly what she was thinking as her eyes landed on the sparkling drums, and her fingers clenched into tight, little fists and relaxed. “The drums,” she finished, voice but a whisper.

“Okay.” He grabbed her hands, kissing them to calm her down, pressing his lips against the soft skin. She was stubborn, and he loved that about her. “Okay,” he repeated, voice edgy with giddiness, delight in the fact that he was influencing her positively. He was changing her, not drastically, but this was where they started growing up together, becoming adults, melding together and sharing interests until they were old and gray and the same exact person. He turned to beckon his friend, the one who owned the drum kit, and he jogged across the room, hurdling over a guitar cases.

“Will you teach her?” He asked, eyes pleading but not desperate. His friend's expression changed from disbelief to awe as he glanced her over. She stood unmoving, strong and firm, arms crossed and eyebrows raised expectantly; she wasn't going anywhere until she got what she wanted.

“Yeah, of course,” the friend smiled, laughing nervously, motioning to the drum kit. The last thing he heard as he watched his friend and his wife cross the room to the drums was something about cymbals. She looked content but a little intimidated as she sat down behind the drum kit, taking the sticks off the floor tom, and experimentally twirling one. Unblinking, she nodded each time her instructor pointed to a drum; naming it, he presumed, diligently repeating everything he said. A hand motion to the hi-hat pedal; a hand guiding eight note hits on the closed cymbals; the pointing hand now aimed at the bass drum, and he watched in awe as his wife drummed like she had been doing it for a year. His other friends looked around the room, still tuning up their guitars, probably assuming it was their own drummer. But all it took was one person to look up when snare hits were added in, and now the man who taught her her first drum line was standing back, doing nothing but watching her just like everyone else.

He kicked the overdrive button on his amplifier, strumming a few power chords to match her drum beat. It only took a few moments for the bass to kick in from across the room, and following right behind it was the lead guitar improvisation. They looked at each other in awe, then looked over at him, jealous of his sheer luck. She was amazing.

She missed a snare hit eventually and was thrown off; laughing, she set the drumsticks back onto the floor tom and stood up, glowing with accomplishment and pride. He crossed the room to meet her.

“Where did that come from, huh?” He asked as he leaned over the drum kit, and she giggled, shrugging shyly. Kissing her softly, he whispered, “I'm a lucky guy,” and his friends tried not to take notice of their moment. Her warm, soft hands came to rest on his wrists, his thumbs sweeping over her cheekbones, and they smiled at each other, feeling like they both won the world.

 

 

  
Winter had returned, the summer having passed in unforgiving heat and days spent in bed, calling off work for no good reason but to lay in the air conditioning. The bite was back in the air, the same chill that led him to her a year prior. She had gotten her own drum kit, an eight-piece one, red and sparkly and beautiful. It gleamed in the corner of their living room, the couches pushed aside to make room for the shimmering, sculptural drums, sticks lain enticingly on the floor tom just like always. His guitars waiting patiently in their stands, his Gretsch and his Airline right next to each other. He had this crazy idea, this idea that they talked and wrote songs, an easy, natural back and forth between the guitars and drums. He told her about it, and she didn't even laugh, but agreed.

“That's why it's so easy,” she smiled, stretching like a cat, smiling over at him from her pillow. The thins strip of light that squeezed through the gap in the thick drapes fell right over her eyes, making them sparkle especially bright. “They write the songs, and then we just feel them out and play them.”

It made sense now, the way songwriting came so naturally to the pair. He would come up with a chord progression, accidentally, perhaps; maybe well thought out. It didn't matter, they were catchy every time. She would listen to it once then ask him to play it again, watching him fixedly from behind her drums, sticks at the ready, before she'd start with a bass drum hit and fall into line with him. They were always perfectly in time, right on track, and the parts fit well together every time they wrote a new song. He'd sing nonsense, vocal improvisation, and sometimes they would both smile in surprise at the ingenious lyrics that were born that way. What was even more astonishing was they way they always ended on the same note, as if by telepathy they had a mutual understanding of when the song was going to end.  
Somehow, someway, she was his soulmate.

One night they lay on the couch, his arm over her shoulders, watching her strengthened hands dip into the bowl for more popcorn every now and again, sometimes holding up a piece for him. The television buzzed meaninglessly, capturing her attentions and obviously drawing her in. He was much more interested in her, however. Her dark straight hair was uncombed, a little messy, but she was beautiful all the same. “So,” he began, and she snapped out of her trance, gazing wide-eyed at him. “I quit the band.”

She stopped chewing, knit her eyebrows together and swallowed. “Why?”

“I like playing with you better, it's...” Her expressions lightened, a smile playing over her lips. “It's just better, you and me.”  
“Okay,” she beamed.

 

  
The night of their first show, she was shaking with nerves, a tingling electric feeling buzzing in her fingertips and under the first layer of her skin, warming her all over, making her stomach turn. “Relax,” he encouraged, smoothing her hair down, skimming his thumb along her quivering bottom lip. “There aren't even fifty people out there.” He smiled, grabbed her drumsticks off the table, her lucky ones, the ones that she had but red stripes on with permanent marker. She said that she liked the way the marker rubbed off onto her hands sometimes, reddening them. It made her feel tougher, she insisted, it reminded her that she had been drumming, that she was good at something. He turned her tiny palm to face the ceiling, pressing the drumsticks into it and closing her fingers around the soft, familiar wood. She closed her eyes, shut them tight, watching the sparks explode behind her eyelids.

“That's more customers than the bar has had since I've worked there,” she whispered, voice solemn and grave, faltering a little toward the end of the sentence. He laughed gleefully, just as someone stuck their head into the little coat room and informed them that they had to be on stage in a few minutes.

“C'mon,” he insisted, pulling her into the big, low-ceilinged room of the club, hazy with cigarette smoke. The dark walls seemed to pack everyone in, and she felt slightly claustrophobic, doing her best to stay pressed up against him. She kept her chin up, eyes staying trained on the stage and her big, shiny drum kit, and now the tingling nerves felt light the vibration from the cymbals in her palms, and she could already feel the slow, delicious burn in her calf from hitting the bass drum pedal so many times, over and over, the repetitive motion finally catching up with her muscles, and all she wanted to do was get behind the drum set and play.

“Okay,” she murmured, voice strong and easily audible above the roar of the crowd. He smiled, kissed her temple, and helped her onto the platform, held her hand until she sat down and grinned at him.

He mumbled something into the microphone that she didn't hear or care to hear. All she heard were the intro chords to her favorite song, the first one that they wrote. She hit the crash cymbal around the edge where it shimmered the longest and he looked over at her in shocked delight. There wasn't usually any crash cymbal until the chorus. She was on fire, her vision blurring quickly, but it didn't matter. She knew her drum kit down to the space in inches between the toms. Closing her eyes, she felt and heard instead of saw, falling into the music as if it were a swift river that pushed her under and swept her away with it. Above the cheers from the crowd, above the roar of the music, above the vibrations from the drums, she felt the familiar warm glow of his proud smile on her, a crystal clear frequency emerging above all the white noise. She smiled back.


	2. To Be Beautiful

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> From the divorce to _Get Behind Me Satan_

“Good show,” he panted, handing his guitar to a stage crew member. He felt winded and exhilarated, just like he did after every show, smiling wearily. His throat was worn and ragged like he might never want to sing again, and his fingers were cracking and burning at the tips from pressing harder than necessary into the strings of his guitar, grinding and bending them against the soft wood of the neck. His head was spinning as he turned a little too quickly, temples throbbing as she appeared behind him. She always lingered on stage a little longer, always like to stare into the faces of the fans and smile and wave, soak it all up like a sponge, because there, behind her drum kit with all those lights on her—that was the last place she ever though she would end up. He held out his hand, waiting for her to take it, staring down the hall as his vision started to tunnel. He was exhausted.

He finally felt her clammy palm slip into his and he glanced around them, making sure there was no one there but their own employees, making sure there were no stray fans or venue workers roaming around. He was always paranoid, despite the fact that the media bought it without question. The believed him: they were America's newest brother-sister rock duo. He was still in disbelief of the reception of the lie; marriage licenses were so easily obtainable. It made them more interesting, he thought, than if they had openly been a husband-wife band. People would go crazy, watching their interactions on stage more than listening to the music. They'd forget about the drum lines, the guitar riffs, and all they would see was the fact that they were married.

He could hear her breathing heavily a few steps behind him and he whirled around, looking into the eyes of his wife, and as she smiled fondly at him he got a heavy, sickening feeling in his stomach.

He remembered the days that he would lie in bed, waiting for her to come home and join him there, staring at the ceiling as the minutes passed meaninglessly until they were together. He remembered how scared that made him; how independent they once were, now so dependent on each other, so needy. She was the only person that made him feel that way, and he was the only person that kindled a feeling inside of her, the feeling that she might have been broken until she met him, and she finally knew what it felt like to be whole. He smiled weakly at her. They hadn't had one of those days in a long time, staying in bed all day, kissing tiredly, laughing and talking. It was almost as if the media lie was becoming his reality. The more he read an article stating that she was his sister, the more he believed it.

She was rambling which was unusual, and he watched her make animated gestures with her now calloused hands, once so smooth and soft, back when she was still his wife, his lover. She was smiling, something about the crowd, saying something about their energy, and he kept staring into her eyes, unblinking, wondering if she felt it too, searching for the right words to say, “I love you and I need you, but you're my bandmate, my best friend, and my sister. Not my wife.”

He surfaced empty-handed, left only with the crude, harsh admission he wanted desperately to soften, to sand down. But she was never like that. She was quiet, yes, but when she spoke, she said exactly what was on her mind. She never spared feelings, never rephrased; she said what she had to and waited for a reaction, bracing for both good and bad. He only hope she like to hear things the same way: uncensored, true, raw.

He stopped her, covering her hands with his own and said exactly what he wanted to, hearing his own voice from outside of himself, echoing dully off the blindingly white cinder blocks in the dressing room. Staring into her black hole eyes he waited, waited for them to show emotion, waited for a scream or a sigh of relief and a small smile or one last desperate kiss or whatever she decided to throw at him.  
“What?” She finally said, and her voice was perfectly clear but her mouth remained unmoving as she spoke. There was a strand of hair in her face that neither of them bothered to move, quivering against her lips with her breath.

He didn't repeat himself; he couldn't. He had said what he needed to, and he knew that she heard him loud and clear. She was refusing to believe it. He could practically see the flashing strobe light in her head, the alarms, the denial. Reclaiming his hand, he set it on his own knee and stared at the floor in defeat. She could run. She could storm out of the room, never to be seen again. She could hit him, slap him across the face and cry. But she didn't.

She moved closer, setting her head on his shoulder, and to his dismay, he felt her shaking with sobs against him. “I love you, too, so,” she began, every word a struggle for her to mutter and for him to hear. He pulled her closer, kissing the top of her head, rubbing her back, screwing his eyes shut. “So if that's what you want,” she continued, words punctuated with choked-off sobs and whimpers, tripping over the things she wanted to say because there were so many, but just couldn't, “then fine.”

The last two words were wonderfully ugly, an oxymoron in themselves, an end to something that was once beautiful but the beginning to something ten times better, so he hoped. He hugged her tighter, waiting for the tears to subside, holding his best friend until she drifted into a troubled, nightmare-haunted sleep.

 

 

 

“I wrote a song.”  
Her eyes gleamed as she approached him, silently smoking the cigarette in her left hand and holding out the papers in her right. He glanced from the papers to her and back to the crudely torn sheets of notebooks paper before accepting them reluctantly. She backed up a few steps until the back of her knees hit the edge of the plush, leather chair and she sank back into it. Setting the papers on the fallboard of the piano, hunching over the keys, he began to dissect it. The lyrics were messily written and a struggle to read but he managed eventually; after knowing her for six years he was accustomed to her handwriting. It reminded him of the notes he found on her cold, empty pillow in the mornings, in the old days when all he wanted was her warm, soft body pressed up against his. Those days felt so far away; it was almost as if they didn't happen.

“Who is this about?” He asked. His voice was careful, scared. He already knew who it was about; it was about him. He just didn't want to hear her say it. He didn't want to know that he hurt her, although he knew that the moment she collapsed into his arms, shaking and sobbing. He didn't want to know that it still eats away at her. He didn't want to think about the damage he had done, the anxiety he'd caused her, or the pain she dealt with, all because of him. The song in front of him was telling him all of that and more. His chest was tight and stinging, and he tangled a hand in his unruly hair and winced as she said, “You.”

“Okay,” he said, voice forcefully gentle. He repeated it a little louder, turning to her. “I'll come up with something.”

He motioned to his guitar, sitting silently in the corner of the room. She smiled innocently and seemed content enough, and he thought that writing must have been therapeutic for her. “You do know you're going to have to sing lead on this if it goes on the album, right?” He asked. She hated singing lead. She hated hearing her voice on recordings, and she hated hearing it relayed back to her through microphones and amplifiers. They both knew it. He crossed his index and middle fingers under the piano bench. Her hatred of singing could possibly have been enough to make her want to scrap the song.

“Yes,” she said, neck muscles pulled tight. She tossed her hair over her shoulder, dusting it back with her free hand, cigarette smoke streaming from between her lips. She looked triumphant. “I already know how I want it to go.”

He smirked, relaxing his fingers. So that was how she wanted to play it. “Let's hear it,” he said, smiled.

“When I'm ready, I'll sing it for you.” She crushed her cigarette out, rubbing the ashes off her fingers.

 

 

 

The show was scraping along just well enough that people didn't boo them and leave the theater. He had a white-knuckled grip on the edge of his guitar, his Airline, his favorite, adjusted the microphone, peeled his sweat-soaked shirt away from his body only to have it cling to his damp skin once more. The lights were blinding him and he was becoming dizzy again, biting the tip of his tongue to keep himself from cursing out the nameless guy manning the spotlights up there, but he kept his mouth shut. That guy, whoever he was, had a family and a life story and regrets, he might have fallen in love at some point, lost someone, had goals and mistakes, just like every single face out there in the audience. Just like the rest of the world. Just like himself. He held his tongue, forced a smile for the well-being of the fans, his best friend, his career. He racked his brain, flying through a mental tracklist of the new record, all the reviews he read online, tapping his fingers on his guitar while the crowd cheered.

She watched him curiously, drumsticks positioned over the snare and ride cymbals. Now was about the time he usually played her favorite one, their first ever song, their first single. But instead, he played the opening chords to her song, the one she poured her heart into, and the crowd cheered. She threw him a narrow-eyed look from behind the wall her drum kit created, a look that said, 'you bastard', and reluctantly joined him center stage. She could feel a thousand eyes on her as she gripped the microphone, spotlight illuminating everything beautiful and everything flawed about her. This is why she hated singing, standing out there alone, naked and vulnerable. Closing her eyes, she started to sing.

The songs always got easier as they went on. With her eyes closed and the near-dead silence of the reverent crowd, she could have been in rehearsal, singing around her house, whatever she chose to imagine. She disappeared, going somewhere far away, singing about the man she still loved. She disappeared back into the old days, the days when they shared a house and played small shows and were terribly in love. Back to the days when they fell asleep wrapped up in each other, kissing until either dozed off, passing into a dark, deep slumber together and waking up nice and slow. He would never be her brother. He was her ex-husband forever, the man she was forced to stop loving but couldn't.

The song ended and she opened her eyes to the screaming crowd, a sea of ignorant, happy people, unaware of what she just admitted to them. She turned back to him, eyes downcast crossing the stage and reappearing in the the dimmer light that fell like a soft blanket over her drum kit. The crowd was still hollering and clapping when she picked up her drumsticks; it wasn't often that she sang lead.

 

 

 

The new album, it was different than anything they had ever tried before. He had taken a liking to playing piano more often than guitar; she didn't argue, but secretly missed the crunchy sounds the chords made behind her drums. When he did choose to play guitar on a song, it wasn't very intricate. It was rhythmic, chords and chords until all the songs started to sound the same and rehearsals became tense and tiring. The first single, it was her favorite and his, so they finally agreed on something and a little stress lifted from them. It became a little easier, a little more normal; things usually weren't that hard. It always flowed easily, naturally, and the songs wrote themselves. This was the first album of theirs that they had to try. It was the beginning of the end.

He wanted a video that made people think. He wanted people to wonder what the directors were thinking when they put it together. He wanted it to be dramatic, creepy, a little disturbing. She just trailed behind him, nodding during all the pre-production meetings, agreeing with a smile whenever they consulted her for something. She was fifty percent of the band, so consulting her was procedure: if she didn't give approve it, it wouldn't happen. That was something they established a long time ago. But she knew, and he knew, and all their employees and directors and producers knew that she would always be stepping right onto his footprints, not even bothering to look up and see where she was going. That's the way things were between the two of them, and it's not like she even wanted to disagree with any of his ideas because they were all amazing. They were so simple that they puzzled people, made them stare at the screen long after the video ended, waiting for something else to happen.

The video, he said, had to make an impact. It had to distract people from the slight change in their sound; reassure them that they were still the same band. There would be a redheaded model crawling around an old, disheveled house. She would be insane, gone stir crazy from so many nights there alone. And they would be co-existing, sitting in the living room, and she was to breeze right past them and not so much as blink at their presence. It seemed that the video had a story line, maybe some sort of veiled meaning but no actual plot developments. It was strange, it was unorthodox, it was going to be like a short horror film. It was going to make peoples' skin crawl, and it was going to return to the minds of those who watched it until they had to go back and watch it again, for the sake of sanity. It made sense to no one but him. It was going to be extraordinary.

She always liked video shoots. She liked watching the video when it was done, seeing herself in costume, seeing herself the way that millions of people around the world did. She enjoyed being pampered, people positioning the fans on her in dressing rooms, people doing her hair and makeup, people bringing her drinks and staring at her so intently when the cameras were rolling. Attention was definitely nice, she though, in moderation. And video shoots, they didn't happen too often. She was allowed to be a little bossy; after all, the whole point of costumes and makeup was to be somebody else for a day, maybe two.

The model was taller than her, especially when she wore those ungodly heels that would probably be impossible for the most experienced runway model to walk gracefully in. She had red hair, of course, because he always loved red hair, and most of the women in their videos were redheads. She had a tiny waist, pale skin, smooth as porcelain, and long, thin legs. She was incredibly jealous of the model, and she could see the way he looked at her. It was the sparkle in his eyes, the smirk on his lips when he held out her hand for her as she tried out the heels for the first time. He grinned in response when she smiled shyly at him, having tripped and gripped his shoulder to catch herself.

“I'll get used to them,” she said, and he tucked some fiery, red hair behind her ear, replying, “Sure you will.”

She hated watching them like that, she hated the way the people on set eyed the pair knowingly. She remembered the days that the people at the bar used to look at them like that because the energy between them was just that undeniably strong. Every once in a while she caught that familiar gleam in his eyes, the one she used to see so much, but this time it was directed at the model. He watched her fixedly from the sidelines as she shot her solo scenes, even when everyone else was supposed to be elsewhere. He'd skipped an editing session to watch, he'd even skipped lunch a number of times just to watch her.

The last day after everyone applauded and shook hands, he kissed her. Everyone was saying their goodbye's, their see-you-next-times, complimenting each other on a productive week and a job well done. Wires were being wrapped up, lights disassembled, cameras tucked back into their cases, and they were in the corner, hands tentatively resting on each other, kissing. She saw everything; they weren't as hidden as they thought they must have been.

It struck her core, hit her like a baseball bat against a flagpole, dull and hard and shocking. She still longed to kiss him, every day that passed by. Sometimes, the hopes that someday he might come back around were what got her to roll out of bed in the morning, stretch, take the time to pick out her clothes and do her hair, all the while thinking that that day could be the day he might change his mind. Then, in that moment, she and him and the model the only three in the room and in the world, it made her realize that that was it. He was never going to come back around, and she might as well move on, maybe open her eyes and try to find someone else, just like he did. No one could ever measure up to him, she knew that for sure. He didn't want her back, and her life was never going to be the same.

 

 

 

“We want you to be the maid of honor,” he said, hands clasped, and what should have been a well-received offer was met with a hard, unforgiving stare. He glared back at her over the table, sitting on the couch opposite hers, and she leaned back to tap her cigarette against the edge of the ashtray. He was the first to blink.

“You lose,” she said, smiling smugly and exhaling a steady stream of smoke into the air. Her hair was pulled into pigtails, just like she used to wear it on stage, and it made his heart catch against his ribs for a second, pause in its steady beating. She did it for a reason.  
“I'm not letting this turn into a stupid game.” His voice was firm, his hair curling perfectly around his face, and she could hardly look him in the eye now. How was she supposed to be the maid of honor at a wedding she didn't want to happen? She was sure there was never a wedding in history at which the maid of honor made an objection. Not that she would object, whether she was in the wedding party or a mere spectator. She was too quiet to ever do something so bold as that. The only person that knew she still loved him was he himself, and she wanted it to stay that way.

“I don't like her,” she stated simply, bringing the cigarette to her lips once more and watching the stream of smoke change shapes, twirling through the air before it dissipated into nothingness.

“Well, she likes you,” he reasoned. “She admires you. She wants to be a musician, too.”

  
She smiled at this, maybe finally figuring it all out. Examining the remnants of her cigarette she decided to put it out. If she tried to pull anything else worthwhile out of it, it would be a waste of her time. Just like him. Eyes trained on her fingertips as she crushed the burnt end against the glass of the ashtray, she wondered why she still bothered despite the fact that he broke her heart on a daily basis, even before the model. Just standing next to him, not being able to hold his hand or kiss him—that hurt her more than anything in the world, a pain rooted deeper in her, much more long-lasting than anything she had ever felt. No matter where they went in the future, whether or not she would ever find anyone else, her heart would always be with him. Her soulmate.

“She wants a record deal,” she said, dryly. “She'll get one now.”

“Please don't be like this.” His voice was slowly rising to a high-pitched whine, pleading. “She wants you to. Please. For me.”  
She met his eyes quickly, with startling force, and the meltdown began. For me. He knew the power he had over her, and she knew the strength she lost, the strength that was stolen from her every time he muttered those two words. He could pin them onto the end of any command, any plea, and she'd do it for him, to make him happy.

  
“For you,” she agreed.


	3. Without A Reason

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> From _Icky Thump_ to _Under Great White Northern Lights_.

They say sometimes that when you're about to die, you know. She felt that way about the last record they made together. She could feel the slow decline, the way that she was either on edge, nervous, tired, or all three—all the time. She stopped having good days. Her new ideas of good days were days when, simply, nothing truly bad happened. Recording, which previously felt exciting, felt more like a chore. She had to force herself out of bed every morning, force herself through the motions of readying herself for the day, then the day itself, finding that as the hours dragged on, she only looked forward to going back to bed.

If their last record had been a struggle to right, then this was a downright war. The songs felt more forced than ever, artificial and commercial. Drumming didn't hold the same electric excitement that it had ten years ago, back when being on stage felt amazing, back when she was in love with the man singing over her drum beat and he loved her as well. She only hoped the album wouldn't disappoint their beloved fans, praying that they sounded as upbeat and enthusiastic as they were supposed to.

Their entire careers, their mission statement had been to keep it as simple as possible: he would use power chords, maybe a riff or scale every now and again. They lacked a bass guitarist; it would hardly be heard anyway, so it was unnecessary. She didn't feel the need to be as complex as other drummers, so she stayed to her crash cymbal, her hi-hats, her bass and her snare. That was all she needed; that was all that was needed to create a solid spine for a song. Their new album—it was a venture far from all of that. She intensified the beats, made them more dynamic, simply to keep herself entertained. It just wasn't as fun as it used to be.

Their tour was in the process of being planned, and they wanted to make it amazing, bigger than anything they had ever tried before.. They wanted it to be recorded, somehow, both knowing that it would probably be their last ever tour. The first thing he thought of was having a journalist come along to take notes, take pictures, and write a book.

“The fans,” she began, quietly, everyone at the meeting turning to look at her. “They want to hear it straight from us.”  
He looked at her with something between sadness and awe, looked at her as someone would look at the endless rows of gravestones in an old cemetery. It was the first time she had ever disagreed with him. She could feel his stare on her, so she fixed her eyes to the wood of the table, traced the patterns it made, and set her jaw into a hard line. She wasn't giving in.

“How about a documentary?” She suggested, spoke up louder than most of the people in that room had ever heard. “You know. Let's film it.”

He nodded, the sadness in his eyes slowly melting away until he was smiling brightly, almost proudly at her. She wanted to tell him to stop, pleading to him with her eyes as best as she could, but he didn't seem to understand. This was an end to something that was once beautiful, and certainly not anything she wanted to celebrate.  
But above all, she wanted to make him happy. She wanted to keep the smile on his face. She forced herself to grin, and it felt like a stake through her heart.

 

The roar of people outside in the hall disappeared when he stretched a finger out and pressed down one key on the piano, questions in his eyes as he looked over at her. She was sitting next to him, their shoulders touching, tired, but he started playing and singing. She recognized the song, the only one from their second to last album she had no part in writing. It was about her, she knew it was, at least a part of it. A line, a word. She smiled softly, watched the words fall like ashes from his lips, slip to the floor in the dim light and disappear. Forgotten.

The camera was bearing into her, she could feel it, but she didn’t look up--not once. She had hated the entire tour: everywhere she turned, a camera was right there. Every sideways glance she gave him, every soft smile that was meant for no one else but him - the cameras saw. Tens of thousands of people would see, too. They would know. And that--that was her first fear. No one else would understand.  
His voice filled the room like smoke, making it harder to breathe; suffocating. It made her eyes water, and then before she could stop herself, she was crying.

She wiped her eye with her thumb, staring into her own lap until the song ended, and before she could sneak away to the bathroom, his arms wrapped around her. She was pulled to his chest and held tight there, and it would have meant everything if he just hadn’t felt so hollow, so distant. She cried harder. To him, it meant nothing. It meant stop crying, the cameras are rolling.

After a moment, he motioned for the cameramen to leave. He heard the tone and the click the cameras made as they shut them off, nodding understandingly, hoisting them onto their shoulders and shutting the door behind them.

“Hey,” he whispered. “What’s wrong?”

She stopped breathing, stopped shaking softly against him.

“What’s wrong?” She asked, voice flat. Emotionless. Dead. “Nothing is ever going to be the same again, Jack.”  
The air felt too sparse to breathe, and his vision started swimming. He blinked once--it didn’t help. Twice. Three times, and she was still staring at him with her black hole eyes, devoid of life.

“Meg, I--”

“Don’t,” she said, turning her head back to the long row of keys, wishing she could play a song, a chord, anything. “Just--play something else.”

He wanted to do so much more; he wanted to help her. He wanted to make her smile again. He wanted her to smirk at him like she used to, grinning at him from behind the long, wooden counter of the bar. A tear slipped down her porcelain cheek, hitting her thigh, disappearing into the black fabric.

He positioned his fingers over the keys, and pressed down.


End file.
